Wednesday, August 20, 2008

So I wrote up a brief story of my transformation. I will make it even briefer for this blog post.

The north-mex diet is mostly meats, cold meats, cheeses, flour tortillas, eggs, and breads; fruits and veggies come mostly in the form of salsas and sweet jams. My personal preferences were of sweets, cake and cookies.

I became athletic as a teenager and I ate a LOT, and that means a LOT of junk. I could eat one big sandwich, cookies, chips and soda as a midmorning snack, after breakfast and before lunch.

I left for college, I stopped all phisical activity but kept eating the same way…eek.

I became a vegetarian at age 24, finding this was easy for me as there is no meat in cookies. At 25 I threw my back out and was in bed for 3 weeks and chose to start working from home. I was sad. :(

Age 29 stumbled upon the Master Cleanse in hopes of happiness. So we both did it. And yes one feels lighter and clarity flows easier when one does something like that. I lost the lower back pain on the second day and lost about a pound for each of the ten days. I felt great, a little dizziness here and there but other than that no problems. This cleanse advices a raw vegan diet after it and I had time to research that further… hmmm does sound good this raw foods thing. Must try, I was already trying vegan eating before that, more like trying to find loopholes like vegan cookies and cakes.

My first bribe into raw foods was Ani Phyo´s donut holes, as soon as I ate that I knew I could leave refined flour and refined sugar behind FOR EVER.

The weight kept coming off easily, every day became exciting and interesting. I connected online with a lot of kindred spirits and I reconnected for real with many old friends. I started keeping a blog in spanish as there is not much information in my language about this lifestyle and I just wanted to share! We started having friends over for dinner a lot, this is fun, but even though people find it interesting, there not as much joining the club as I had hoped ;) This is why it was an obvious choice to go to the Raw Spirit Festival, we craved community, we craved the vibration of our tribe, and this event totally delivered that and more. I loved every minute of cacao high, love high and amazing food high, the information, the people, books and the happiness that could be breathed in.

One of the books bought there was Victoria Boutenko´s 12 Steps to Raw Foods. This book has some advice for people looking for community. It said teach a class. And this has worked better to find people highly interested in raw foods and in being at least hi-raw. I get to learn a lot in these classes and people respond well to the food. This also keeps me researching and experimenting more into this lifestyle trying new things to share.

One of those amazing experiments of health was the 92 day JuiceFeast. I had read about Angela Stokes´s juicefeast, found it admirable but pretty out there. Then all of a sudden it started popping out everywhere, Terilyn, Philip, Heidi… interesting. A whole event around it. I can´t really say I jumped into the wagon because of these reasons. In January I had a miscarriage. This would have been a terrible thing even one year earlier, but I felt rather levelheaded and in the present, I know I owe this balanced non dramatic response to the health and strength I got from raw foods. But the JuiceFeast came up in the perfect moment when I wanted to regenerate my cells, heal my body as much as possible before conception. It made sense and we jumped in then and there. It was an amazing experience of healing emotions. There is no reactive eating of the dates and almonds. I wasn´t much aware that I did this before. So it was a big experience of growth and awareness.

My current personal work is to heal the mind. And it is a fine interesting work to do.

So these are my most extreme pictures. One is just before I started my transformation journey. I call this my lowest point picture, I dislike it very much, there is no energy in my face it looks like I rather be asleep or somewhere else. The second picture is a couple of weeks after the JuiceFeast, a totally different place in my life, very energetic and very aware of my body and what it needs to thrive.

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comments:

I love hearing/reading others incredible personal journey into the raw food lifestyle. I am sorry to read about the miscarriage earlier this year but happy to know that you felt balanced and we able to coop. I truly believe "raw" does bring a huge sense of balance, even calm. I have experienced this for myself many times over through this lifestyle. So many incredible experiences.

I'm actually starting as a smoothie feast, then graduating to a juice feast...one day at a time, two days at a time, and slowly building up until my emotions don't battle so hard against my actions. I know it will be quite an emotional purge, and I already struggle with being raw vegan. Perhaps struggle isn't the right word, but I have a rebellious streak that seems to tantrum over cheese now and again. :)

Thank you so much for your supporting, kind words and be assured you have an avid 'watcher' now! (Does that sound creepy? Lol.)

Oh! My burns are doing WONDERFULLY. I am such a lavender addict now, I swear.

I love your story and your transformation Linda. I see how your new glow and confidence shines bright. When I first saw you at RSF I thought for sure you must be a professional model. I look forward to getting to know you better through your blog, raw sites and hopefully at another festival! Blessings friend!